Originally published at: Look at all these lemons on this recently planted tree | Boing Boing
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Just look at i… wait? What am I supposed to say… it’s not a banana?
But I will look at them, because they are beautiful!
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Wait wait, what? I was just going to skim the article for pretty plant pictures, but what are you doing with blood orange in a sazerac?
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What area of the country are you in? My apologies if I missed it in your article, but I’m a bit jealous of your results here and am (hopelessly, I’m sure) daydreaming that it could be possible in the Midwest. 
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Venice Beach, CA – I should update the post.
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blood orange peel for the garnish.
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I hope this isn’t a sign that life exhausted its supply of lemons last year and it needs your tree to help supply it for 2021.
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Better luck than I’ve had with growing citrus trees.
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We brought home a Meyer lemon tree from Costco in Tucson a year ago, and it made all of two lemons in a big planter. At least it didn’t die.
We just planted it in the ground, in the hopes that something will happen. Given the moonscape situation in the yard, I’m not holding out a lot of hope.
I think a humidor is called for.
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Meyer lemons apparently do well as basement container plants in the Midwest.
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I’ll have to give that a shot. That drink can be a little spartan, and a twist of lemon never seemed to brighten it up quite enough to me.
I’m a huge fan of orange peel with any drink that has sweet vermouth. Flamed whenever possible.
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Is the Fuji self-fertile? Many apple varieties need another apple (any variety) nearby to get pollinated.
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Yes, self pollinating. Still a decent amount of bees moving around here. Also the Blood Orange has a resident lady bug who chases aphids around like mad.
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I’ve had several of these dwarf citrus trees. They’re fun. Only about $20 for the tree, another $20 for a big pot and good soil. After my first year of tender care, I got 5 nice lemons.
Next day at the grocery store, I noticed lemons were 3/ $1. 
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My garnish for any cocktail is more booze, I’m a heathen I know.
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The lower half of California is known to be ideal for citrus fruit trees. A lot of your success is just geography, I’d guess. The lemon tree in my MIL’s yard in Pomona, CA seems to bear fruit a few times each year and when ripe, they are nearly the size of grapefruit! She isn’t fertilizing, watering, or pruning the tree either.
But let’s get down to brass tacks here…BB pays well enough to live in Venice AND have a yard? That’s millionaire territory, right there. 
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Secret Chimp - also lives in Venice, just south of the pier, in a condo.
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Oh? That sounds delicious. 
I’ll have to look into that. Thanks for the tip!
Citrus is not the thing in these climes (WiscoDisco), but if you’ve got the blood oranges going on, this video from Chef John for blood orange marmalade looks amazing:
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We have an apple tree that took about 8 years to produce useful apples. (About a 1/4 mile down the road, someone has our tree’s mate, and they’re about the same age.) We now have apples on their normal schedule of producing a big crop every other year. And this is production year!
No citrus for us, they don’t much care for Michigan winters. Two cherry trees, though, and a few raspberry bushes. We have some blueberry bushes, but they never produce (because we forget to feed them in the fall).
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I’ve kept potted citrus (Meyer lemon, dwarf thornless Key lime, and some sort of SOUR mini tangerine-like thing) for years. I’m in North Alabama, so quite different climate than Venice Beach. Some thoughts:
My Meyer lemon is quite happy in a pot. I lift it every couple years in the late winter to refresh the soil. It blooms in the early spring (blooming now) and will set a bunch of fruit. Later in the spring it will drop a bunch of them and keep only what it can handle. Fruit ripens late October into November. Even a relatively small bush/tree will produce a surprising amount of fruit. A little pruning after harvest helps too. This past November/December I got enough fruit for 30 half-pint jars of marmalade, a lemon custard pie for Thanksgiving and a few extras for whatever needed some lemony goodness.
The Key lime is more temperamental. It blooms and sets fruit on some schedule known only to itself. Sometimes it’s full of fruit, sometimes it pouts, usually it is working on growing a few .
The sour mini-tangerine-type is a bit of a mystery. I inherited it from an in-law, and I have no idea what it is. The fruit peel very easily like tangerines, but are much smaller and SOUR. It usually produces fruit in the fall too, but this year they didn’t start ripening until late January. I made one small batch of marmalade and am using the rest in place of lemons and limes in anything that needs a hit of citrus.
They are all pretty easy keepers. I leave them outside most of the year, only bringing them in if the temps go below 27F (not an issue in Venice Beach). Water, but not waterlogged, fertilize some but not too much. I should probably prune them more than I do, especially the Key lime.
Here are mine after I moved them back outside last month (l to r Meyer lemon, Key lime, mini-tangerine):
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